Presentation to DCC Children's Scrutiny Committee on 11.9.17

Many thanks for your overwhelming support for this petition which is focused on ensuring that pupils with high levels of additional needs in Devon can continue to access prompt, necessary financial support through the DAF process in order to enhance and sustain the early intervention support schools have put in place for them.   I am presenting this petition to the Devon County Council Children's Scrutiny Committee on 11th September.  If you wish to contribute, please do so by 10th September so that all your views can be collated and shared at this meeting with all relevant councillors.  Please continue to sign and share this petition. Dawn Stabb has written to parents apologising for the anxiety this has caused parents and stated that 'appropriate communication' with parents was planned for September.  She has directed families to the Devon SEND local offer pages which can be found at http://devon.cc/sendsupport and these are due to be updated in the Autumn.  The key facts document which has been released confirms however, that although no funding will be removed in September, no new DAF funding will be available and current DAF funding will only continue after next year's review if that DAF is converted to an EHCP.  This leaves several significant questions to be answered: 1) Will the LA assure children, families and schools that all non-statutory funded pupils will be entitled to an EHCP despite their differing thresholds? 2) Why would the LA cut non-statutory funding if it expected to then be issuing the same levels of funding through EHCPs?  This would not address the deficit in the £61.5 million Higher Needs Block. 3) How might one term's notice be deemed as "as much notice as possible" for schools to complete the necessary paperwork, plan the professional visits from educational psychologists and other multi agency professionals, and work in a meaningful way with families to ensure that the EHCP process enhances their child's support plan and truly addresses their needs?  It will be impossible to secure an EHCP for every pupil in receipt of non-statutory funding under this timescale.  Schools and school staff already work beyond capacity and this is an unnecessarily short timescale to strategically and sensitively manage a significant change to funding for the most vulnerable.  The assertion that "the new system should not require significant additional work" is false, as a year's worth of reviews, plus additional transfer paperwork, will be required to be completed in one term. 4) Why has the significantly positive impact of non-statutory funding been ignored?  The key facts document states that "some of the existing non-statutory plans might have been better progressed through a statutory assessment route to see if the child needed the statutory protection that an EHCP brings."  This does not reflect on, or celebrate, the multiple instances of non-statutory funding reducing exclusions, allowing prompt, early support for vulnerable pupils and supporting children and families when they were experiencing significant challenges. 5) I understand that there is no legal requirement to provide additional top up funding through a non-statutory funding option, but Devon prided itself as a pathfinder under the new Code of Practice, supporting children and families in the right way and enabling all children to learn but ensuring those that benefitted from additional support could receive it.  As a SENCO, I take pride in working for a Local Authority who recognised the importance of this and valued the impact that this financial investment had on all pupils.  Why does the local Authority not also value this? 6) What systems have been put in place at the SEND 0-25 team to ensure that the huge increase in requests for statutory assessments can be managed and statutory timescales adhered to?  This team are already overstretched and struggling to meet the tight timescales.  Have other professional services e.g. Virgin Care, NHS and Babcock Educational Psychology services been given advanced warning to increase their capacity to cope with the increase in assessments and evidence which will be needed to support all the new statutory requests?  It seems likely that they also have not been given "as much notice as possible." 7) What support will be in place for children, families and schools if pupils who are currently in receipt of non-statutory funding do not meet the threshold for statutory funding and therefore have their funding, and therefore a significant proportion of their provision cut?  Are there plans for how to address the inevitable decline in behaviour and attainment, the increase in exclusions (and associated costs) and joblessness amongst talented SEND support staff for where this happens? 8) How has the whole £61.5 million Higher Needs Block spend been analysed to ensure that this is the right way to save money? These questions need to be answered fully, transparently and promptly. Whatever the answers to these questions, it remains the fact that schools will not be able to convert all non-statutory funding to statutory funding whilst carrying out their other responsibilities in the timescales dictated.  This will result in a loss of funding for some pupils.  This will result in a loss of provision for these pupils and this is likely to impact on their attainment, outcomes and behaviour.  This will impact on all children's school experiences. Many thanks for your support, I hope that together we can bring about change and ensure that our children with SEND continue to get provision which allows them to achieve and flourish.